


A Thousand Lifetimes

by CaptainJimothyCarter



Series: Tumblr Prompt Fics [60]
Category: Agent Carter (TV), Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Alternate Universe - Wings, Angel Wings, Cliche tropes of royalty, Drabble, F/M, Fantasy, Modern Royalty, No edit we die like men, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Protective Peggy Carter, Royalty, Steggy - Freeform, This makes no sense but here we are, Wingfic, Wings, stevepeggy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-03
Updated: 2020-12-03
Packaged: 2021-03-10 10:34:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27849442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainJimothyCarter/pseuds/CaptainJimothyCarter
Summary: Steve had always felt some kinship with his next-door neighbor despite they've only known each other for about a year. He stumbles through her apartment and witnesses her knocking a man out with a baseball bat, the shock running through him.Life takes a turn when Peggy admits she's royalty and it seems her demons are trying to find her.
Relationships: Peggy Carter/Steve Rogers
Series: Tumblr Prompt Fics [60]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1952281
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14





	A Thousand Lifetimes

“Peggy?”

The name slipped from Steve’s lips in a worried tone, hearing the heavy thumping past her apartment door. He frowned at the frame, watching the silver number three jiggle and fall to the carpeted floor with a heavy  _ thunk.  _

_ What the hell was she doing in there?  _ She’s normally much quieter than this, almost to the point Steve forgot that his new neighbor of a year now was even home half the time.

She’d moved in practically overnight, with nothing but a backpack thrown over her shoulder and a smile on her red lips. Over time the apartment filled with furniture and knickknacks to make the small place home. She was easygoing and laughed everything off. 

They’d first met when he was carrying too much at once, boxes stacked on top of each other and trying to balance his small frame as he carried them to his front door. He hadn’t seen her, all he saw were a pair of white flats that were suddenly coated in pizza sauce when they’d collided. He heard her fall before he fell himself, the weight of the boxes toppling over and his groceries for the week were spilled over the floor.

He’d apologized, despite it hadn’t been his fault, even offered to take her shoes to the dry cleaners because those looked expensive but she said no and laughed it off. That laugh, the sound of church bells ringing in the distance made him relax and believe everything wasn’t so bad as it seems. It didn’t mean he wasn’t embarrassed, trying to salvage what he could. She’d helped him clean up and give him more than enough money to replace his groceries five times over, apologizing once again.

Then they just...kept running into each other, pausing in the hall to chat or wait for one another on the elevator.

When the lights had gone out during a storm, Peggy was knocking on his door with a generator in hand. When he questioned it, she said she noticed how he had to use an oxygen machine sometimes and wanted him to use it in case the power didn’t come back on. She had spent the night on the couch despite his insistence she should take the bed. They’d both slept on the couch that night, Peggy’s head in his lap.

It was fond touches like that, little gestures that made him think  _ okay  _ something was there. Could be there. If only either of them reached out and grasp it. He was trying to work up the courage to ask her for a date but as of late, these last few weeks, Peggy had been withdrawn, rarely came out of her apartment, and seemed to push Steve away at every opportunity.

It worried him simply because that wasn’t Peggy.

Another thunk hitting the door drew the blonde from his thoughts. This time it  _ defiantly  _ sounded like a body hitting the frame. He had no weapon on him, no means to defend himself but the portrait he’d spent hours painting down at the rec center. 

Peggy could be in trouble.

That terrifying thought alone caused him to shoulder the door open, hurting his frail shoulder more than the door. He stumbled through and took in the torn apart apartment. The few pictures she’d bought off of him had been ripped from the walls, her furniture turned over, drawer contents emptied, and the trail just continued to her bedroom where the sounds were coming from now.

Stepping over a painted scene of a meadow that he’d done for her, Steve slowly followed the trail into the bedroom. 

A grunt was heard and a body came stumbling towards him. Steve didn’t hesitate, taking the thick, framed painting and slamming it on the guy’s head. The force cartoonishly rips the canvas in the middle and made the taller, broader man stumble. It was enough of a shock for Peggy, bruised and bloodied to knock the man out by swinging the bat at the man’s head.

Steve’s eyes widened as he watched the body slump to the floor, looking up at her. Her hair was a frazzled mess, matted and stuck to a gash on her forehead. Her lip was split open and her eye blackened. There were rising bruises around her neck where someone had choked her and a few on her arms. The blouse and jeans she wore were splattered with blood, a sinking feeling telling Steve that most of that was not her own.

“Is he...is he…?” He didn’t know if he could finish that statement. He didn’t want to know.

“No, just knocked out. I didn’t hit him nearly as hard as I possibly could,” Peggy panted, lowering the bat to sag into the wall. “He’ll wake up in a few hours with the worst headache in history and a reminder to leave me the hell alone.”

Nodding his head as if this all made sense and this was a normal occurrence, Steve could feel the shock running through his system. His mouth opened to question her when she grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and dragged him down the hall to throw them both into the bathroom. She jammed the shower chair against the frame and turned back to him, barely able to make him out amongst the dimly lit bathroom. The only light came from the frog nightlight over the sink.

“What the-the hell is going on?!” Steve stuttered, scrambling to stand up.

“Sit down!” She ordered, Steve instantly dropped back down. “And lay low for a minute.  _ Hush.”  _

She pressed her ear to the door, her breath held. Whatever she was listening for, she didn’t find. Steve watched as she slid down the wall, taking in a deep breath that barely contained the emotions.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t....want you to get involved, but now that they’ve seen you...they’ll involve you. I wanted to protect you.” Her voice had dropped to a whisper and Steve swore he had heard  _ again  _ but at this point, his ears were ringing and he was starting to feel nauseous.

“Whose out to get you? What’s going on? Pegs, seriously. I deserve to know if I’m involved now. Are you with the mafia?”

The question made Peggy laugh, laughing until she started to cry. Despite how he should be angry, Steve dragged himself over to her and laid her head on his shoulder. She held onto his small frame and cried for a solid few minutes.

“I’m sorry,” she apologized yet again. “I don’t have much time to explain before they realize we’re in here, but I’ll explain as much as I can, okay? Those guys...the one you saw me beat up - he’s from an organization named HYDRA. No, they’re not the mafia or the mob or whatever you want to call it. They’re royalty.”

Steve’s head bobbed as if this made sense. As if he knew it all along. “And...they’re after you because you stole the family jewels?”

“No, doofus. They’re after me because they and my family have had a long-lasting history that spans generations. They’re after me because I  _ left.  _ I’m not...Peggy from England who moved to America for a new start. I...I’m royalty, Steven.”

“Uh-huh. Are you sure you didn’t hit your head?”

She made a frustrated noise in the back of her throat, laying Steve low to the cold floor seconds before a bullet shattered the small window above them. 

“You have to believe me, Steven,” Peggy whispered, holding tightly to his collard shirt. “I know it sounds far fetched and trust me, the more details I go into the more far fetched it will sound, but you  _ must  _ trust me. I have to keep you safe. I have been completely selfish and I apologize for that - you were not meant to be involved. You had a nice life.”

Any questions Steve had were lost and he had plenty of them. She spoke to him, at him, stuck in another memory, another lifetime. She sounded almost whimsical and distant in her tone, the way her hands clung to him soothingly rubbed at his jawline. 

“Okay,” he swallowed, flinching when another bullet buried itself into the wall. “How do we get out of here? Only way out is through that door.”

He followed Peggy’s eyes to the laundry chute and his heart dropped. “Oh no,” he groaned. “No.”

“You want to face Brock Rumlow out there - fella is one of the sharpest shooters I’ve met. Or do you want to go down the long slide like the child in you wants to?”

She had a point, but he could remember as a child going down the slide and getting stuck for  _ hours.  _ It terrified him. His answer was chosen for him when the bathroom door started to shake on its hinges. 

Forcing Steve up to crawl, Peggy ran to the door, putting her full weight into it. She waved her hand at Steve, teeth-gritting when it bulged against her. “Go! I’ll be right there.”

Throwing open the chute, he threw one last look at Peggy, desperate, worried before jumping down. His last look of her nearly blinded him in bright, white light, and the sound of a male voice screaming.

* * *

Changing into ‘borrowed’ clothes is not how Steve saw his day going. The ball cap was far too big for him and kept sliding over his eyes. The black button-up smelled funky and the jeans were twice his size, he had to roll the pants legs up twice to get his feet free and hold them up with his hand. 

Yet, Peggy insisted this would help them escape. A change of clothes and keeping their head down. She found clothes amongst the masses around them, a simple sundress that someone was too lazy to even take the tags off of. She hid her hair under a blue, silk scarf, pulling sunglasses out from the lost and found box. They made quite the pair but somehow Peggy looked better. 

Steve watched as she pulled a backpack from behind a false wall, and grabbed at his hand. “Have you been preparing for this?!”

“Since I first arrived, yes. Questions later, Steven.”

The sun was starting to set, painting Brooklyn in a warm glow of orange and pink with the fluffiest white clouds anyone could’ve painted. Nothing looked real. Nothing felt real. He felt like he was walking in a waking dream at this point. His feet lead him wherever Peggy tugged him through, keeping up just because of the hand she held. 

As promised, he kept his head down and eyes on the ground, which was fine because he couldn’t see his feet in these pants. He felt disgusting like he needed ten baths just to feel himself again.

Ten baths and questions answered.

What the hell was going on? She said she was royalty. She had knocked out a man. She knew the people she was fighting and yet convinced that he had lived a normal life? She spoke as if she knew him, knew some part of him that he had yet to even know. 

The sky was hidden behind the thick wave of clouds, blocking out the night sky and making everything seem more dreary than it was. Brooklyn even felt more dreary than normal, the mass of people was gone, still some on the street but not nearly as much. People avoided them and he could hear Peggy mumbling to herself in something that didn’t sound like any language he’s heard of.

“Where are we going?” He finally asked after the unkempt turn down some alleyway. He stumbled over a loose brick and cursed as his knee bashed into the wall.

Peggy easily hoisted him onto his feet and led him down the long, cool path. “Safehouse.” She sounded uncertain and he didn’t like that. 

“Seriously. Where? Because I feel like we’ve walked all of Brooklyn at this point.” Peggy shot him a look that instantly shut him up, sighing. “I’m just frustrated, okay?! I know nothing and now my life is in danger because-because you’re, what, a princess supposedly who didn’t wanna play royalty?!”

She stopped them to let him go, letting him fall back into the wall. Maybe it was the play of the street lamps but her eyes suddenly looked older. Not just by years but decades, like she’s lived a thousand lives in his simple one.

“You have no idea what my life has been like,” Peggy hissed, pointing a finger at Steve’s thin chest. “The sacrifices I’ve had to make, the choices I’ve done, the people,  _ my  _ people who suffered because of it. Because I tried to do the right thing. I lost my brother to these men’s cruelty, Steven, and yes, yes I know this isn’t fair to you at all, but you…” 

Her eyes had turned almost golden in the light and in a blink, they were gone. She took in a sharp breath and scrubbed at her face, shaking her head. “Let’s go,” she continued. “A few more blocks, then we can rest.”

* * *

They were two more blocks over when a crowd of people passed through them, separating them. Steve stumbled through it, losing sight of Peggy. He  _ heard  _ it before he saw it. He felt it. Everything was in slow motion - the bullet expertly cutting through the air, missing every person but its target. 

_ Peggy.  _

She wordlessly fell to the ground, bleeding from her shoulder. The bullet hadn’t passed through but it did nothing to help the gushing of blood. She gritted her teeth and touched the wound, pulling away to see the red staining her fingertips. 

No scream. No sound of pain. No falling apart as any other human would. 

The people around them didn’t react - they still walked around the pair, obvious to the bleeding woman on the street. Did they not see what the hell he was seeing?

“Peggy!” Steve shoved a man out of the way to get to her, kneeling to cradle her. “We have to get out of here. They’re going to keep firing.”

She grunted as she staggered to her feet, throwing herself to grip at the light post. Steve swore her eyes turned gold again as he took her good arm and threw it over his shoulder. His one hand tried to do the best to use the ripped end of his shirt to press against the bleeding wound as he walked with her.

“This way.” 

Her voice sounded weak and frail, a thousand miles away. Older than what she was herself.

She leads him towards a hotel, the name lost on him as he stumbled through the revolving door with a bleeding woman sagging against him. The only person to have some valid reaction was the single receptionist. Her eyes widened at the sight of a pale woman leaning onto a scrawnier blonde, standing up instantly with a phone in hand.

Peggy reached across to put a hand on the receiver, shaking her head. She said  _ something  _ and maybe it was the shock, but this time Steve knew it wasn’t in English. Something in the back of his mind, that tiny voice that has always been there since he was a child translated for him,  _ Arrow Suite.  _

The woman silently nodded, hitting a button on her keyboard and handing Steve a golden key card with the instruction to tap it once to open their door. 

Getting up to the suites was hard enough, Peggy losing strength with each step of the way. By the time they were inside of a large hotel with grand windows, spread out furniture, even a kitchen, and living room, she was barely conscious.

Sitting her on the bed, Steve rushed to grab the first aid kit from the bathroom and tugged her dress down, apologizing the entire time. He didn’t expect this to greet him.

Scars. Peggy’s back was littered with scars, thick scars that laid in no simple pattern, crossing over one another. Some looking older than others. Larger scars stood out from the rest, burn marks that mirrored each other perfectly. His fingers had brushed over them and she hissed, jerking away from the touch.

“Don’t...don’t do that. Get...get the bullet out of me. I can...heal it on my own. The copper - it’s taking my strength.”

He wanted to question it, but at this point, he’d do anything Peggy said to keep her alive. Giving her a towel to bite on, he got to work pulling the bullet out with a pair of tweezers and rubbing alcohol. Sure enough, a copper bullet fell to the bed and he batted it away, thinking it must’ve still been hot to burn his hand as he did so.

Peggy groaned as she laid a hand over the sluggishly bleeding wound, a bright, white light coming from her fingertips. Steve had to look away, reminded of the light he’s seen earlier. 

“I think…” Peggy sighed, tongue darting out to run over her dry lips. “You deserve an explanation. C-Call room service for me, please?”

* * *

Taking the coffee cup from Steve, Peggy downed the sludge inside in two minutes flat while he picked at his plate. She stood up slowly to pull the rest of her clothes off, in the time it took dinner to arrive Steve had shed his clothes and taken a hot shower. She was used to her nudity but as he looked up at her, holding tightly close the robe, something about her wasn’t human.

She just didn’t look  _ human  _ in her skin. He should be embarrassed about seeing her naked and some part of him was, but he was more annoyed and frustrated. Embarrassment can come later.

She strolled closer to him until they were a foot apart and raised her arms as if to make some grand speech before they dropped. Her mouth opened and closed and all at once, she had wings.

Bright, white wings.  _ Pure.  _ A golden hue around them as she turned around for Steve to see they had come from the very spots that had been burned. She turned back to him, the food falling from his plate as he struggled to place what he was seeing. He touched them, stroking over the tips, and shaking his head.

“What...I…” Why wasn’t he so much shocked by this?

“You know,” Peggy whispered, kneeling so they were level. She shuddered at his touch, taking his hand to pull it away. “You know what I am, Steven. Some part of you always has, hasn’t it? Some voice in the back of your head tells you this.

“I am not human, the people on the earth consider me an angel. The closest to texts I could find classify me as an Aasimar. We are a civilization that is vast and well beyond these simple mortal’s lives. I am...one of the Fallen. The scars you saw? Burn marks? Those are scars of my pasts, marking me for my sins. The smaller ones are from the time I spent in HYDRA’S hold, being tortured for who I am, for the information I hold. I spent  _ thousands  _ of years in their company.  _ Thousands.  _

“And all to save you.”

Her lips twitched, her warm, brown eyes now turning a shade of gold. Steve swallowed, feeling as Peggy had said, he knew this. This was repeated history and yet, he didn’t know this. 

“I don’t understand. How. Who are you? What’s going on? How did you get here? HYDRA? -  _ What?”  _

A small laugh escaped her throat, a hand coming to tussle his hair. For his sake, she wrapped herself up in a soft robe and sat in the chair across from him to give them some distance.

“Once upon a time, Steven, you and I were bonded. Soulmates. You bore my mark and I bore yours. We lived hundreds of lives together, we spend decades together, learning to love one another. We grew up as children, to teenagers who got in far too much trouble, to sturdy adults. You were to become my partner, to rule beside me. Until the day you were cruelty ripped from my arms.

It was our ceremony. You were to become my husband, my partner. We were to be placed on the throne and take over my father and mother. You looked so handsome, you always did. We were steps away from touching and…” Her throat closed up, but she pressed on. “You were killed. A bullet had pierced your heart. The only mercy I had was that your death was a quick one.

War broke out a week later.”

“With...HYDRA?” Steve murmured, feeling a shiver run down his spine. He laid a hand over his chest, where he knew a puckered scar laid. It was always tender to touch. “How did you become a Fallen? Get captured? You said your brother…? And...how am I here? How are you here?”

The questions just made her smile again, shaking her curls. “Little one, there is time, shush.”

“Yes, with HYDRA. My brother insisted on leading the first charge. I insisted on going but I was forbidden. I was forbidden without my soulmate to rule the kingdom as well. My brother, Michael, was killed in battle. The first killed amongst thousands. They put his body on a stake, where others could see it. He did not get the mercy of a slow death. 

I left that very night, I snuck out from our kingdom and trekked to HYDRA’S walls where my brother laid, decaying. It was foolish to think I could do something but I was so caught up in a rage, with the loss of you, the loss of my brother, far too much. I killed their leader that night. Schmidt choked to death on his own blood, a rod made of copper burning him from the inside out.

I was captured. I was tortured. I was made to watch as HYDRA invaded my kingdom and killed my mother and father and killed anyone who defied them, who rose up against them. I singlehandedly destroyed my kingdom with my actions. 

Time had passed and my bond with you never faded as one should when their partner dies. It was the only thing that gave me the strength to leave. To fight my way out. I did the only thing I could do. I burned my own wings off. I disguised myself as a human with what limited powers I still possessed. I found a way to earth and...found you. 

I tried to keep my distance, but I couldn’t. I was drawn to you. I still am. You know me, you know this because you’ve lived it. You were reborn as a creature of this earth but you still possess the knowledge of your other lives. I had hoped that upon seeing me you’d remember everything, but I am not that lucky. I wanted to keep you safe but I couldn’t. I failed even in that.”

Her head hung and Steve found himself drawn to her, kneeling between her legs. His nimble fingers cupped her cheek and pressed their foreheads together. She was right - he didn’t remember. Yet he had some feeling that he did. It was locked away inside of him, the key thrown away. He couldn’t explain the complicated emotions inside of him, the guilt on her face felt like a copper rod was in his stomach right now.

“I want to.” It was the only thing he could think to say, pressing their lips together.

A shiver ran down Steve’s spine at the touch of her lips to his. More than a shiver, his nerves were on fire. A trail of them spreading out in open flames in all directions. Burning from the top of his head to the souls of his feet. His shoulders ached the worst, muscles twitching, nerves searing in white-hot pain.

He couldn’t even scream, Peggy held him close and kissed him again. She was speaking to him, trying to calm him down. He couldn’t hear it, his ears were roaring.

Then all at once, it stopped. He laid against her, panting hard, feeling weak all over. His eyes slowly opened to feel a pair of wings on his back. They were just like hers - bright white. Smaller, but they felt like home when he touched them.

He remembered. He remembered Peggy, their life planned together before either was even born. He remembered going to school with her, stealing sweets from the kitchen, sparring with Michael, decades and decades of reading in the library.

He remembered the nervous feeling of the ceremony, his last sight was of Peggy before he just  _ woke up  _ one day, here, in Brooklyn. None the wiser.

“Steven? Are you…?”   
  
Steve pulled away and shakingly got to his feet, flexing the wings slowly with a shaken grin. She looked up at him with a fierce amount of pride that made his heart melt. 

“I remember,” he whispered, his lips barely moving. “And we’re going to get our kingdom back, Pegs. HYDRA will fall, I promise you that.”


End file.
